Robert Owens' last points in Worthen Arena might well be his most memorable.
The senior forward's 3-point play with 1:01 left gave Ball State a 74-66 lead, and the Cardinals held on from there to defeat Akron 76-72 in the first round of the Mid-American Conference Tournament. The sixth-seeded Cardinals will square off Thursday with No. 6 Miami in the quarterfinals at the Gund Arena in Cleveland.
Ball State moves on with a 14-14 record. The Zips, who lost 77-71 in overtime when they visited Muncie earlier this season, bow out at 13-15.
"This is as well as I've seen Akron play," Ball State coach Tim Buckley said. "(Akron coach) Dan (Hipsher) did a terrific job of getting his team ready to come and play on the road with one day of preparation. They gave us everything they had.
"Once the anxiety wore off, I thought we settled in and played much better."
With more than a minute remaining, Owens received the ball along the right baseline. When nearly all in attendance thought he would bring it back out, Owens spun around Akron's Romeo Travis and dunked over Rick McFadden, who fouled him on the play. Owens added the free throw to produce the largest lead by either team.
"I saw (Travis) cheating to the high side, so I just spun baseline," Owens said. "The opportunity was there; I just took advantage of it.
"Those kind of plays just happen. You can't force them."
Owens, a 78.6 percent free throw shooter, made just 6-of-11 attempts against Akron, but managed to lead the team with 20 points and nine rebounds.
"With me, it was emotions, because it was my last game in the arena," he said. "I played almost the whole first half teary-eyed -- my emotions were so high."
Owens dunk and free throw was the last of several big plays that kept the Cardinals ahead of a dogged Akron team in the second half.
The first came after the Zips' Derrick Tarver forged the game's 13th tie with a 3-pointer at the 5:16 mark. Terrance Chapman responded with a trey from the left corner, then blocked Tarver's attempt to answer at the other end.
Matt McCollom split a pair of free throws after grabbing an offensive rebound, then buried a 3-pointer from the right corner with 3:14 to go, putting the Cards ahead 71-64.
"That's what you have to do in these type of games; you've got to make winning plays," Buckley said. "I thought we did those things when we needed to."
Akron drew within three when Dru Joyce hit a trio of free throws and buried a long 3-pointer, but McCollom split another pair at the line with eight seconds remaining.
"We fought our tails back to a tie," Hipsher said. "Chapman hit a big shot, and we didn't answer back."
Tarver, the MAC's leading scorer, paced the Zips with 25 points, but he did so on 10-of-25 shooting. Joyce (15 points) and McFadden (14) nailed four 3-pointers apiece.
"He did a really good job," Buckley said of Tarver, a guard who played in his last game. "They went to him early and often in the second half and we didn't have an answer for him. We decided to put Terrance Chapman on him, who's a little bigger and stronger. We tried to force him outside, and I thought Terrance did a fantastic job."
Chapman, who scored 15 points off the bench, acknowledged that Tarver was a difficult matchup.
"He was pretty tough to stop because he's strong down there," the junior forward said.
Junior guard Dennis Trammell tallied 18 points on 7-of-11 shooting. Peyton Stovall dished out eight assists, while McCollom and Cameron Echols pulled in seven rebounds apiece.
"They really have each other's back and are playing for each other," Buckley said of his team, "which has been our theme the entire year."
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